


Paired Up

by juniperallura



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-23
Updated: 2017-03-23
Packaged: 2018-10-09 18:51:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10418802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juniperallura/pseuds/juniperallura
Summary: Lance and Keith are sent on a mission to infiltrate a resistance group and form an alliance (on a planet where everyone has a "pair.")(aka an excuse for some fake dating & public hand holding)





	

      “Don’t _fidget_ with it-”

             “Don’t yell in my ear!”

“ _Guys!_ Pay attention!”

Lance slapped Keith’s hand away, making one last attempt to adjust his micro earpiece as he muttered, “I could if Keith would stop yelling…”

“ _I wasn-_ ” Keith cut himself off, folding his arms and taking a flat tone, “We’re listening, Shiro.”

Far above them Shiro sat at his controls in the Castle, rubbing his temples as he watched two dots blink on the monitor’s map. “As I was saying- after this I’m going to disable the long-range function on your earpieces. Once you get inside you’ll be searched and we don’t want anything setting off those scanners; the Pretaria don’t trust easily. When you return to the checkpoint you can re-enable them with _three_ taps and give your report. Got it?”

“Got it,” Keith nodded, brows furrowed with concentration.

"Yeah, but, Shiro-” Lance started fidgeting with his earpiece again, “Do we have to-”

Shiro cut him off exasperatedly, “Yes-”

Keith and Lance could hear a faint voice echoing behind Shiro. “…still? We should have sent Pidge…”

“Wait, _what?_ ” Lance shoved his finger into his ear, as if to hear Allura woeful words better. Shiro’s chuckle, however, came in loud and clear.

“Nothing, Lance. Anyway, we’re waiting up here if you need an extraction. Good luck.”

Before Lance could get another indignant word in, the line went dead.

“Are you ready?” Keith narrowed his eyes, his steady expression challenging Lance’s fuming exasperation. “We have to focus, there’s no room to screw up on this. I’m activating our short-range locators and tracking vitals.” He threw his hand out towards Lance. “Let’s go.”

Lance pouted for a second at the rebuke, but grabbed Keith’s hand with a silent nod. As they walked towards the mouth of the alley the light _ping_ in Lance’s ear began to speed up. “Ha!” he smirked, “So you _are_ nervous.”

Keith frowned, blowing air out his nostrils. “So what? Stop listening to my heartbeat-” Keith’s voice dropped when they reached the dimly lit entrance to the building, his grip loosening ever so slightly.

Two towering bouncers, clad in the same navy robes the Paladins wore, held up their hands. “Stop there,” they said in monotonous unison, “Over the wintry forest, the winds howl with rage-”

Perfect pupils, Lance and Keith repeated the line Allura had drilled into them. “-With no leaves to blow.”

With a nod the doormen parted. “Welcome, New Pair. Leading Pair will be arriving soon.” Eyes flickering to each other for just a moment, Lance and Keith stepped into the darkened entryway.

| v | o | l | t | r | o | n |

The door closed behind them. Keith took a slow seat on the bed, his brain whirring with everything they had learned. A planet-wide resistance against Zarkon, organized with sharp accuracy down to the last pair and cloaked in complete secrecy. He rested his elbows on his knees, trying to mentally catalog every face that had flashed before him in the murky back room.

“I mean, she called us _Handsome Pair_ , but who? Both of us? Just one of us? As a pair? Me? I mean, of course _me_ but-” Lance paced up and down the threadbare carpet, stopping only to fling his robe over the two wooden chairs shoved into the corner.

“ _Lance_ ,” Keith cut in, “How can you even care about that? We have to report to Shiro.”

Lance stopped short, his face dropping. “That’s not a good idea. We should wait.”

“What? Why? This is our checkpoint.”

“You didn’t notice? The girls at the front desk had red dots right under their eyes, and that pair in the stairwell were following us the whole way here.” Lance threw up his hands at Keith’s blank expression. “That means they’re _loyalists_. Working for Zarkon.”

“And you’re just telling me this _now_?” Keith stood up, jabbing a finger at Lance.

“Calm down,” Lance waved his hand dismissively.

“I guess if they were _really_ suspicious we’d be — dead.” Keith pinched his brow, trying not to let a knot tie itself in his stomach. “So what do we do now? We can’t go to another meeting if we’re being tailed, and we can’t report to the Castle…”

Lance flopped onto the bed, hands tucked under his head. “We go sightseeing.” Keith held back a sharp reply, throwing Lance a look instead. “That’s what we told the front desk pair, right? We’re in the city for sightseeing. So let’s go; we take in some Pretarian culture, get some _food_ , and get those Zarkon goons off our ass.”

Keith opened his mouth to reply, but after a second of trying to reason with himself let out a resigned sigh. “Fine. I guess until we figure out our next move…we can go _sightseeing_.”

“Great,” Lance answered through closed eyes. “I sleep on my back- and I’m not scooting over.”

It was only then that Keith noticed the room came with one double bed.

_He hated pairs._

With an exasperated sigh Keith shut out the light, climbing into the bed. Trying to get comfortable, he shifted onto his side, eventually closing his eyes with his back turned to Lance.

Both of them heard the quiet ping in their ear begin to speed up.

  (Both of them ignored it.)

Just a few hours later, Lance was pulled from sleep by a sudden pressure on his shoulder. His eyes flew open, air leaving his lungs in the conviction it was a Galra sentry catching him off guard; however, it was only a familiar pale hand gripping his shoulder. Lance shifted slightly to see Keith on his side, eyes closed but brow furrowed and lips moving silently. His warm breath blew steadily on Lance’s arm. Eyelids half closed, Lance’s lips curled into a smile as he laid a hand over Keith’s.

_What._

In a flash Lance’s hands were at his sides and eyes were squeezed shut in a remarkable impression of a corpse; the only thing that gave him away was the heat that consumed his face.

| v | o | l | t | r | o | n |

Keith let out a puff of air every time his chest grazed the floor, trying to chase away the straying thoughts that tugged at his concentration. He had to focus on the mission. Not on the way Lance’s skin seemed to glow in the morning light. _Especially_ not that. Why couldn’t he have been ‘paired’ with Pidge? Or Hunk? Or literally anyone else besides Lance? Impossible to work with, distracted, saved them from being instantly located by Zarkon, charismatic, stupid _Lance_?

“-How are you doing push ups right now?” Lance’s bleary eyed face peeked out from the edge of the bed.

Keith hopped up from the floor. “Hurry up and get ready, I don’t want to hang around here long.”

Lance got up to stretch, but only after clarifying, “You’re not the boss of me.”

Keith turned to hide an eye roll. “I just want to get this over with so we can file the report and get one step closer to taking down the Galra.”

“Say that a little louder, will you?” Lance raised a brow as he stooped to grab a fresh shirt. “C’mon, it’ll be fun. Those girls did call us Cute Pair,” he wiggled his eyebrows, “Maybe we can use that to our advantage, score some free Pretarian ice cream-”

Keith glanced over his shoulder just as Lance was pulling his shirt over his head. Whipping back around red-faced, he cut in sharply, “We’re here on a _mission_ , not on vacation. I’m not gonna have _fun_ holding your hand all day-”

Lance scoffed, throwing up one hand as the other pulled through the sleeve of his shirt. “Whatever, man- I’m just trying to make the best of this so we don’t get _caught_ in public.” Lance bent down, pretending to look for his shoes while the heat left his face.

Keith let a few beats of tense silence go by before he hesitated and said, “Handsome.”

“-What?” Lance kept his eyes to the ground.

“The girls, from the front desk. They called us Handsome Pair.”

Both were glad their vital monitors were off.

| v | o | l | t | r | o | n |

“-And it seems our transmission was accepted by the resistance leaders without being detected by Zarkon. Coran and I will continue to be in contact with them while we hammer out the details of our alliance.” Allura closed her projection monitor with a tap, beaming across the conference table. “Very good work, boys.”

Shiro and Pidge nodded resolutely at the Princess. Hunk, however, raised a hesitant finger, brow raised towards his fellow Paladins. “Uh- sorry, one quick thing. Are we gonna talk about how Lance and Keith have been holding hands this whole time?”

“-And they’ve been wearing matching outfits for two days straight,” Coran cut in matter-of-factly.

Lance and Keith immediately unclasped their entwined fingers, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes as blood rushed to their faces.

“ _Pshht_ , we weren’t even-”

“-It’s a force of habit-”

“-A Pretarian thing, you guys wouldn’t even-”

Keith stood up abruptly, his chair scraping across the floor. “If the briefing is over, I’m going to train,” he declared, arms crossed and lips pursed.

“ _Yeah_ -” Lance cried among stifled giggles, also standing but remaining at the table, “I’m gonna- go… _nap_!”

“Don’t get into Keith’s bed by accident!” Pidge called after their retreating backs.

The doors slid shut behind them, but after a moment muffled voices rang out from the hall-

     “ _Quit following me!_ ”

         “You _quit following_ me!”


End file.
